Dear Editor
by Amy Newman
Each
prose poem in this incomparable collection is an impassioned letter to
a nameless editor from a writer (“Amy Newman”) seeking publication for
poems — about sainthood, chess, and the poet’s solitary childhood — that
we never get to read. Taken individually, the poems display a rich and
daring originality; together, they culminate in an exquisite exploration
of memory and longing.
“One of the most gifted and original poets in America today.”
—Martha Collins
“That Newman has created poems this accomplished would be worthy of praise
in any circumstances. Doing so while detailing the flaws and lacunae
of language itself is a definitive mark of excellence.”
— Danny Leigh, The Guardian (London)
“A poet who has attained true mastery in her ability to play with language.”
— Sarah Steinke, Image
“Her ability to yoke the luxuriant with the lean resonates in a compelling
imbrication of images and rhythms.”
— Simone Muench, Another Chicago Magazine
“The virtuosity with which Newman approaches [her poems] is startling.”
— Joshua Kryah, Pleiades
Dear Editor by Amy Newman
Paper. 88 pages. $15.00
Published by Persea Books
www.perseabooks.com
Amy Newman is the author of four books of poetry: Dear Editor, winner of the 2010 Lethi Rudnitsky Editor's Choice Prize (Persea), fall (Wesleyan), Camera Lyrica (Alice James), and Order or Disorder (Cleveland State), and two chapbooks: BirdGirl Handbook (Green Tower Press) and The Sin Sonnets (Scantily Clad). Her work has received awards including the Green Tower Press/The Laurel Review Prize, the Cleveland State University Poetry Center Prize, the Beatrice Hawley Award, and The Missouri Review Perkoff Prize, and has appeared in many journals in North America and Europe, including The Kenyon Review, The Missouri Review, Image, The Gettysburg Review, The Georgia Review, Narrative, Ploughshares, The Laurel Review, Timpul, Acoma and Poesia. She's been awarded state arts grants from Illinois and Ohio, and a Fellowship from The MacDowell Colony, and is Presidential Research Professor at Northern Illinois University.